Camping in Central California!

This past weekend a few of us drove up to Bishop, CA, which is just south of Mammoth Lakes on the east side of the Sierra Mountain range.
Camping Partner, Special Friend.

Our tent site at the Pit, which was free, courtesy of the research groups that rented out the whole place. High desert, yum!Hard to beat butter, eggs, avocado, tomato, and cheddar. Really hard.


We took time out to do some hiking up to Treasure Lakes, through the snow that we weren't quite prepared for.

John Muir Wilderness is one of my favorites, for sure.
Retreat!!! Snowballs aren't supposed to be that big!
South Lake, outside Bishop, CA. 81 degrees, 10,000 feet, Sunny, Snow on the ground. Bliss.
Aspen groves were out in full force! So beautiful to see the shimmering leaves!

And I forgot to take any snaps, but this is a reasonable stock photo of one of the TWO hot springs that we visited during the weekend!
Thanks, iStockphoto!

Also, the Bishop area has some of the best bouldering around, so we naturally had to take it easy with some climber friends
Dynamic move to the crux of the problem!
Soft hands to cradle.
Harder than it looks.

Stuck~!

Hooping with the Sierras as a backdrop (and a canyon just behind the cameraman).


Triumph! Love this shot because of the colors. It's got a swath of green in the center/right, blue at the top, and reddish tones on the bottom left.

Thanksgiving Adventure!

With Utah ranking as my favorite US state for the outdoors, I couldn't very well turn down an offer to backpack Zion over Thanksgiving! After a tortilla-roll filled day on Thursday, we woke up Friday morning in one of the most aptly named National Parks this great land offers: ZION!

My friend Rip is an excellent photographer and has posted some pictures from the trip, and I'm stealing some here. You'll find more stunning photos on his website: RoadTripRip.com or click the photos.

Highlight photos on this post, email or call me for stories.

Sunrise alarm clock. Can't be beaten! Here's my pad on the edge of the west rim, facing east (South and North Guardian Angels just off the photo to the right). Favorite moment of the trip, thanks Rip. (And yes, wine bottles backpack well. And I'm not kidding.)
Gotta love those natural curves! I haven't found the link between me and rocks, but I feel its probably stronger in some of us. They make me melt.

Just gettin' some good use out of Rip's smoked glasses:
The crew on the hike down from the rim (and I do mean down). Clockwise from top left: Rip, Katie, Nick, Lauren, Conor, Caroline, Holden.


Footsoak in the frigid water on the canyon floor was sublime!

And I know it's been a while so here are TWO places not to fall down!


This one's a bit of a vertigo display. (But probably won't look like it on such a tiny computer screen!)

(Yep, the end of the video is Angel's Landing, from the back.)

Monday morning was time for some jumping pictures! Style points for synchronization & also for symmetry:

Excellent picture of a burned AND frozen log. Oh, and that whole lighting thing.

Rock climbing in NZ

Just a note about climbing here in NZ. It's pretty special.

Someone made a movie about it, you can watch the 5 minute trailer here.

What he says is right, about the attitude of the climbers, and the frequency of the climbing sites. It was a lot of fun just to go out and boulder around with some amazing climbers the evening I stayed at the hut.

I think that climbing here deserves a trip in itself. Need to get a bit better to appreciate what this place has to offer. Either that, or just move down here like some of the climbers did!